Prince George could be the new home many immigrants coming to Canada are looking for, but the city's bad publicity may be keeping them away, according to author, publisher and motivational speaker Nick Noorani.
Noorani was the keynote speaker at a celebration banquet on Saturday marking the conclusion of the three-year Welcome PG pilot project. The program provides resources for employers looking to hire immigrants and immigrants seeking information about Prince George.
"People don't know you, they don't know Prince George, and I wonder why," Noorani said. "Studies have shown that immigrants have higher outcomes in smaller communities than in larger ones."
Noorani said he had many misconceptions about the city before coming here, based on media reports about crime and air quality.
"I have a friend who came to Prince George. I said to her, 'Really? Prince George?'" he said. "She said it's a beautiful place. She was right. I will talk about Prince George for a long time to come. What makes community is the people."
Noorani is president of Destination Canada, in 2000 he co-authored Arrival Survival Canada and in 2004 founded Canadian Immigrant magazine. In 2007, he sold the magazine to the Toronto Star, and continued to act as publisher bringing the circulation to 500,000 readers per month.
He also hosts a talk show on Radio Canada International and presents a series of motivational speeches geared for recent immigrants.
But in 1998 when he arrived in Vancouver with his wife and two teenage children he struggled like many immigrants, regardless of their background. He was born in Mumbai, India and worked in advertising and marketing in Mumbai, Abu Dhabi, Muscat and Dubai.
"My first job in Canada, we all have them... survival jobs, was as a telemarketer selling the Vancouver Sun. Ironically, before I came to Canada, I operated the largest call centre in the Middle East," he said. "Every time I opened a newspaper, I read about immigrants who failed. I asked myself, 'if every immigrant who comes here fails, why did I come?'"
Canada has great programs for immigrants, but "you have to go to 16 agencies to get the answer to one question," he said.
In 2000 he wrote Arrival Survival Canada to address many of the questions he and his family had struggled to find answers to.
He started to get calls and e-mails from people moving to Canada who had no friends or family.
"My wife and I would stand in the airport holding placards for complete strangers. We would take them looking for places to live... and I would personally guarantee the bills of immigrants to the landlords," Noorani said.
He'd take them to garage sales to find furniture and essentials, he said.
"Immigrants build their first houses on garage sales. I won't throw away my slow cooker, even though it's the slowest slow cooker I've ever seen... because I bought it for five dollars when that was a lot of money to me," he said.
On July 1, 2003 he and his wife bought their first home in Canada.
"For anyone who's been an immigrant, buying your first home is really important - maybe more important than getting your citizenship," he said. "That same month, within two weeks of each other, my wife and I were both laid off."
For some time he'd thought about starting a magazine for immigrants focusing on successes and providing information for new Canadians.
"Canadian Immigrant magazine was started in my basement with a credit card and lots of prayers," he said. "Suddenly you started getting some of the success stories coming out. [And] when immigrants succeed, Canada succeeds. Every immigrant who comes here brings a connection to their home country - it is a business opportunity."
Canada is in competition with other developed nations, which also have aging populations, to attract skilled immigrants, he said.
"If we do not get immigrants starting to work in their fields, we're going to to lose out," Noorani said. "According to the Conference Board of Canada, every year Canada loses $5-6 billion by not recognizing immigrants and utilizing immigrants' skills."
